Irish regulator fines Facebook owner €390m after EU rejects argument for use of data to drive personalised ads
The business model of Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta empire has been dealt a blow following a ruling that its legal justification for targeting users with personalised ads broke EU data laws.
Campaigners said the move could force the Facebook and Instagram owner to ask users to “opt in” to having their data used for targeted ads.
Continue reading...Resorts open hiking trails and lifts for mountain bikes amid unseasonably high temperatures and lack of snow
Europe’s record-breaking warm winter weather has closed ski slopes and forced resorts to open summer trails or shut altogether, as grass and mud replace seasonal snow from Chamonix in France to Innsbruck in Austria.
Eight countries across the continent have recorded their warmest January day ever, with temperatures in parts of Switzerland and southern Germany exceeding 20C and 90 monitoring stations in France setting new records over new year.
Continue reading...Ten-year-old who fell into a narrow open shaft on New Year’s Eve at construction site confirmed dead
A 10-year-old Vietnamese boy who fell into the narrow open shaft of a concrete pillar at a construction site on New Year’s Eve has been confirmed dead, state media said on Wednesday.
Rescuers spent nearly 100 hours trying to free Ly Hao Nam from the 35-metre-long support pillar driven into the ground, but without success, online newspaper VnExpress cited a local government official as saying.
Continue reading...Bernard Squarcini and 10 others await magistrates’ decision on hearing charges including influence peddling and forgery
French prosecutors have called for the former head of the country’s internal intelligence agency to stand trial on charges of influence peddling and forgery.
Bernard Squarcini, who was head of the DCRI agency – the French equivalent of MI5 – until 2012, is also accused of complicity in breaches of professional and judicial secrecy.
Continue reading...Ukrainian shelling that killed 89 recruits aided by mobiles switched on near frontlines, claims Russia defence ministry
Russia’s defence ministry on Wednesday blamed the use of mobile phones by its soldiers for a deadly Ukrainian missile strike that killed dozens of conscripts, sparking anger among relatives of the soldiers.
Commenting on the deadliest single incident Moscow has acknowledged since the start of the war that it said killed 89 servicemen, Lt Gen Sergei Sevryukov said in a video statement that a commission was working to investigate the circumstances of what had happened.
Continue reading...Alidoosti was arrested for support of women’s movement in Iran, including posing on Instagram without hijab
The celebrated Iranian actor Taraneh Alidoosti has been released from prison by the authorities after her friends and family provided bail. Pictures of her outside jail with campaigners holding flowers and without a hijab were shown on Iranian social media.
She had been arrested for issuing statements of support for the women’s movement in Iran, including by posing on Instagram without a hijab, the compulsory hair covering in the country.
Continue reading...Police in spotlight after claims they failed to respond to reports car with five men had not stopped
The death of a 20-year-old woman who was reportedly dragged for almost an hour by a car after a vehicle collision in Delhi has provoked outrage and calls for justice.
The woman was driving home from work in the early hours of New Year’s Day when her scooter and a car collided. News reports say the car driver and four passengers, all male, did not stop, dragging her body for miles through the streets of outer Delhi.
Continue reading...Business groups fear government will halve energy support after March, while commuters face more disruption on the railway
Households in the UK spent £1.1bn more on groceries in December than a year earlier, taking Christmas spending to a record £12.8bn, but got fewer items in their baskets as rampant inflation hit home.
Many stocked up on alcohol to enjoy while watching the men’s football World Cup, with sales of beer reaching the highest level for the year on the day of England’s quarter-final against France on 10 December.
This was a big drop. Mortgage approvals fell by 11,800 in November, the biggest fall since April 2020 and are at their lowest level since June 2020. This is not the news the housing market was hoping for in the first week of the new year.
Mortgage approvals are the key lead indicator for housing transactions, lower mortgage approvals today means fewer housing transactions tomorrow. A reduction in housing transactions will hurt all those businesses that are involved in the home-moving process, but the absence of forced sellers implies that house prices will not fall as far or as fast as housing transactions.
Continue reading...Search for Malaysia Airlines plane that disappeared with 239 people on board should resume now that new equipment and data is available, expert says
The Australian government should get behind a new search for the wreckage of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, the man who headed up the initial search says, now that new equipment and data is available.
Peter Foley was the program director for the international effort, led by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, to find the plane. MH370 went down on 8 March 2014, with 239 people on board. The disappearance of the plane is one of the world’s greatest enduring mysteries.
Continue reading...UK company makes decision because of growing tensions between Beijing and the island
Brompton, the UK’s largest bicycle maker, has said it is planning to reduce its dependence on China and Taiwan for parts, amid fears of a growing military threat to the island from Beijing.
The company known for its folding bikes is among various western firms hoping to ensure they can source supplies from other countries, as concerns mount over rising geopolitical tensions, and even a possible future invasion of Taiwan by China, which considers the island to be a breakaway province.
Continue reading...Bloc recommends negative coronavirus tests from all arrivals despite warnings from Beijing of retaliation
The European Union wants all travellers from China to take pre-departure Covid tests, in response to surging levels of the virus after Beijing hastily abandoned strict controls.
EU officials meeting on Wednesday in the “integrated political crisis response” format said there should be a requirement for a negative Covid test from all travellers from China, despite warnings from Beijing of retaliation.
Continue reading...Sean Patterson, 33, reportedly killed by gunman while he was standing by pool at guest house in Bogue Hill
A British man has been shot dead at a villa in the St James parish of Jamaica.
Sean Patterson, 33, a personal trainer from west London, was found with gunshot wounds to his upper body and head at around midday on Monday in Bogue Hill, police said.
Continue reading...Few of the country’s previous World Cup winners traveled to pay homage to the football legend
Some of Brazil’s best-known footballers have faced a furious backlash as fans and pundits questioned why they had failed to attend ceremonies bidding farewell to Pelé.
Hundreds of thousands of people waited for hours under a burning sun on Monday to file past the recently deceased soccer legend’s coffin at Santos’ Vila Belmiro ground.
Continue reading...Kyrylo Budanov says he expects fighting to be ‘hottest’ in March, with a Ukraine counter attack in the spring. This blog is now closed
The city administration in Kyiv has said that 160 million passengers used the city’s subway in 2022, compared with 319 million passengers the previous year. It also said that about 5.200 people used the network for shelter on New Year’s Eve. In a statement posted to Telegram, the city authority said:
On new year’s eve, during the air raid, about 5,200 people, including almost 400 children, used underground stations as shelter. The subway infrastructure operates 24/7 as a shelter and provides the most necessary conditions: drinking water, sanitary facilities and the possibility of recharging gadgets.
Continue reading...Gaelic origins of Icelandic words and landmarks challenge orthodox view of Viking heritage, says author
According to folklore, a Gaelic-speaking warrior queen called Aud was among Iceland’s earliest settlers. Her story is central to an emerging theory that Scottish and Irish Celts played a far bigger role in Iceland’s history than realised.
A book by Thorvaldur Fridriksson, an Icelandic archaeologist and journalist, argues that Gaelic-speaking Celtic settlers from Ireland and western Scotland had a profound impact on the Icelandic language, landscape and early literature.
Continue reading...Burial place has fallen into severe disrepair, to dismay of families of those laid to rest there
Wild vegetation smothers the crumbling tombs, most of them dating back to the 1800s, that line the square beneath the imposing Chiesa Madre, or Mother Church, at Poggioreale monumental cemetery in the southern Italian city of Naples.
In the middle of the square, a makeshift storage area has been installed for coffins containing retrieved skeletal remains of the dead that were flung out of burial niches after a series of collapses at multistorey marble columbariums last year.
Continue reading...About 200 people laid roses and wreaths in a central square in the city of Samara, where some vowed to ‘avenge’ the victims
Mourners have voiced grief and anger at a rare public commemoration in Russia for the scores of soldiers killed on New Year’s Eve.
Admitting its worst military losses from a single Ukrainian attack, Russia on Tuesday said 89 servicemen were killed when a temporary deployment point was struck in Makiivka, a town in the eastern region of Donetsk partially held by separatists since 2014.
Continue reading...Berlin insists all financial claims have been settled as Warsaw seeks £1.2tn for war losses
Germany has rebuffed the latest push by Poland’s nationalist government for vast reparations over the second world war, saying in response to a diplomatic note that the issue was closed, according to the foreign ministry in Warsaw.
Poland estimates its losses in the second world war caused by Germany at 6.2tn złotys (£1.2tn) and has demanded reparations, but Berlin has repeatedly said all financial claims related to the war have been settled.
Continue reading...Statement contradicts president’s announcement of six-month truce between country’s five largest armed groups
Colombia’s largest remaining guerrilla group has contradicted government claims that they had agreed a national ceasefire, in a setback to plans to bring peace to the Andean nation after decades of violence.
President Gustavo Petro had announced on New Year’s Eve that the country’s five largest armed groups had agreed to a six-month truce, but on Tuesday the National Liberation Army (ELN) rejected the claims, saying it had not been consulted on any such plan.
Continue reading...Coffin of Brazilian footballer, who died aged 82, taken to cemetery near stadium where he began career
The Brazilian footballer Pelé has been buried in the port city where he began his career nearly 70 years ago, with the country’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, flying in to lament the “irreparable loss”.
Pelé, who died last week age 82, scored most of his 1,283 goals for Santos football club and it was at a cemetery near the team’s Vila Belmiro stadium where he was laid to rest on Tuesday afternoon after an emotional three-hour procession through town.
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